So I have now been dealing with sinus issues for the past 6 months, and it has been horrendous to say the least.
BACKSTORY: It all started in December, when every single morning I had to blow my nose for about 45 min straight before I could do anything. It was just constant. Then, I went to 2 different general doctors in my network. My first doctor told me to take mucinex, dayquil, claritin, and flonase all at the same time. Did not work and I felt cracked out basically. Then, I went to my normal family dr. she prescribed me a Z pack, which did nothing. Then I was SO sick like almost flu like symptoms and I went to urgent care, and she prescribed me amoxicilllin that also, just did nothing. I then went to the ENT and by that time it was about March. Meanwhile I had been rotating between Sudafed, mucinex, you name it for MONTHS. ENT prescribed me prednisone + doxycycline and I felt great... until I didn't.
NOW: Fast forward to now, I just went to a different ENT and she said that she thinks I could have asthma? Prescribed me Montelukast. That did virtually nothing. I took that for atleast 2 weeks. Awful dreams. Then, I went to an allergist. She did full bloodwork, I am allergic to NOTHING! I also have had bloodwork throughout all these tests and no covid, no mono, no flu, no nothing.
I am at a loss for words. I have spent every dime on these fucking doctors. I literally have reached my limit for my out of pocket maximum. (thank god) but I just do not know where to go from here. I just asked my doctor to do a CT scan and a chest x ray. I need help. I am wheezing, coughing, and just generally so mucusy all day... No clue what is causing it. My allergist prescribed me the normal allergy sprays (azelastine + fluticasone) They work - but damn do I have to take these every day for the rest of my life? Not to mention they just take the edge off, really.
I need any and all advice. Please help me. I need another route or any other ideas out there.

I’m having congestion and took a mucinex dm & my usual dosage of lexapro 10mg this morning.
I didn’t realize it could cause serotonin syndrome… will I be okay?? Ugh

im on bubroprion and awhile ago i took mucinex dm and saw it said not to take if on MAOI’s. i took it because im not on an MAOI. after the third day of taking it, i woke up at 4am and i was hallucinating and paranoid. i was freaking out and it was terrible.
recently ive had a cough from allergies and my mom got me a different cough medicine and to look at the ingredients on the back and it was the same as mucinex DM. why did i get a bad reaction with dextromethorphan when im not on a MAOI? i really wanna use it because it worked so well

Does your doctor still keep you on metformin while being on ozempic? I'm not seeing a difference in my daily tests if I miss a dose or two of metformin. Just want to see what others are doing/other doctors.
Also, does anyone know if their are smaller pills or a liquid version of metformin. The pills the size of Mucinex DM are sometimes hard to take.

This is prompted by a visit to my doctor's yesterday where I went in about a persistent cough and the NP I was seeing hijacked the appointment* to talk about my high blood pressure.
At the appointment my BP was reading at 142/80. She brought up that at my previous appointment (first appointment with this office) in March was 140/80. She was very insistent I start blood pressure medication. I managed to talk her out of it because the only time I've had medical staff tell me my BP was too high, was when I was taking medication where that was a side effect. I have not been on that medication for 3 years and my BP has been normal at most appointments. She tells me I need to monitor it and follow up with either her or my regular doctor.
When I got home I found my discharge paperwork from a visit to Minute Clinic on Apr 22 where my BP was 122/80.
What could cause my BP to fluctuate like this? I'm worried being put on BP lowering medication could potentially put me at risk for dangerously low BP.
34F, non-smoker, 5'5" 230lbs
Medications: Nikki oral contraceptive, Levothyroxine (I don't remember the dosage), acetazolamide 250mg twice daily + I have been taking antihistamines, Mucinex DM and Flonase for the symptoms I went in for.
I was diagnosed last year with pseudo tumor cerebri last year which is what I take the acetazolamide for.
Additional information if it helps:
I have high cortisol (>30 as of last lab in November). I drank a small sugar free red bull before the appointment (80mg of caffeine) because I had to wake up early and have not been sleeping well for several months now. Normally my only caffeine intake is tea which never exceeds 1 cup and is not a daily thing. I know caffeine can increase BP after consuming it so I felt it was worth mentioning.
*My cough was addressed as an afterthought after she laid into me about the blood pressure and I was just prescribed Solair.

32F, 5'2", 196lbs, non-smoking, non-drinker, no substance abuse, no known allergies. Prescriptions I take are gabapentin, buspirone, duloxetine, spironolactone, ropinirole, and propranolol. I take vitamins D3, iron, and folic acid.
Some time last year, I had a sudden, painful choking fit while taking some of my medications. I coughed up most of what I tried ingesting, but I assumed the rest likely went down the way it was supposed to. Now with my current ongoing issues, I can't help but wonder if maybe a pill DIDN'T go down the way it was supposed to?
About 8 months ago, I believe, I started having occasional issues with coughing up noticeably thick wads of sputum. OTC allergy medicine did nothing, but I shruggedv the problem off at the time. About a month after it started, I started coughing up considerably bloody wads, with the addition of lingering chest ache/discomfort around the time of these instances occurring. Coughing up bloody wads wasn't terribly frequent, but coughing up wads of sputum and the chest discomfort were daily.
The chest pain had me scared, but my usual doctor was booked for a few weeks. I took my chance with one of the local fast pace clinics, but after an okay X-ray, they figured it was bronchitis. I was prescribed Mucinex DM, Albuterol inhaler, methylprednisolone, and doxycycline hyclate. The pharmacy found it odd that I wasn't tested. The medications didn't seem to help, but at least the inhaler offered relief for the coughing fits and shortness of breath.
About a month or two later, I finally went to see my doctor, and after doing some testing and reassessing of the data from the fast pace clinic, my doctor concluded that the only next step was to do a CT scan to try to figure out the problem. She did eventually try prescribing me some azithromycin in a more recent visit in hopes of treating this as well as my mysteriously sudden chronic rash, but unfortunately, it didn't seem to help with either issue.
I'm no longer coughing up crud on a daily basis, I can breathe pretty normally, and I haven't seen any blood in a month. However, coughing up thick sputum is still happening, and the chest discomfort and coughing fits still happen fairly regularly. I haven't yet gone to get a CT scan due to finances, but I might try to next month after one of our car repair bills gets paid off.
So with all of that said, is it possible that I aspirated a pill? If so, could it possibly have caused this ongoing problem?
I apologize for the length of this post, but I appreciate your time and possible assistance.

Unfortunately catching a cold from the kids and bro.Any suggestions on what cold medicine to buy?.I use to take DayQuil ,Mucinex and alkerseltzer but now with ibs I’m unsure.I tried Sudafed sinus recently but I had awful cramps,bloating and diarrhea.

Hi all.. I started to get a nasty cough last week and it’s still here. I have had body aches and a very small fever a few times. I’ve been alternating advil and Tylenol for the body aches and also taking Sudafed and mucinex DM.
I’m wondering if anyone else has gotten a cold on Wegovy? My concern is I’ll heal slower and also that those meds just sit in my system longer which is not good for my gut.
Thoughts?

Hello
I am a 38 yo female 5'5' who was hospitalized with pneumonia from April 12 - April 14 of this year. I was put on various anti-virals and antibiotics to treat both what could have been bacterial pneumonia and varicella pneumonia as I was exposed to a child with chicken pox at work. I am an infant teacher and this child was not yet old enough to receive the vaccine... I however had never had chicken pox although I am vaccinated against it.
I have felt pretty good from MOST symptoms except my o2 sat still drops when I am active and takes a little while to come back up to a normal level. Which in turn, this leaves me short of breath still. How long do these residual effects from pneumonia last?
I had my follow up with my primary the Monday after I got out of the hospital and also found out that I am very low in iron, so she put me on iron pills which I started on 4/23 once I had completed antibiotics and what not.
Anyone have any tips and tricks on how I can get my o2 sat back up, and how long this shortness of breath is going to last? I returned to work yesterday after being out for 2.5 weeks and my o2 was ok most of the day. However today, my o2 was on the lower side most of the day and I felt awful. I am on light duty, so I wasn't even doing much today and was sitting whenever I could to conserve energy. I can't afford to be out of work any longer.
Its been three weeks as of May 3 2024 and I am just over feeling like this - as well its making my sleep even more disturbed than it was previously so I haven't had a decent night sleep in weeks. I had none of these symptoms before I got sick and was hospitalized and although my primary is aware of remaining symptoms she doesn't want to give me any prednisone or z-pack to try and kick the remnants of what I have - even though Mucinex DM isn't even touching the remaining symptoms I have. (Cough, runny nose, clear /yellow tinted mucous)

I've taken mucinex sinus max for the first time. After about 15 to 30min, my body has started to feel weird. Not necessarily bad- just... off. I'm not dizzy, confused, or anything concerning. I'm curious if anyone has gotten drowsy or odd experiences with mucinex sinus max, since I only mostly see people talk about mucinex dm. Also, I'm on duloxetine. I've taken medicine like Sudafed and other decongestants- as much as I know I shouldn't- so I'm not very concerned with that either. Just this odd body feeling.

Is it ok to take mucinex DM at night? Will it keep me up? I’ve been hearing different opinions.

30s M, 6-0, 180ish pounds, white, nasal congestion/trouble breathing, length is 1-2 months (severity goes up and down), drink, no drugs, medicines below
No matter what I seem to do, I feel congested -- like bad allergies or a bad cold. However, allergy and cold medicine don't work (they usually do for me, though).
Here's what I take daily for allergies (and have for years):

1. allergy medicine (Claritin)
2. saline nasal wash
3. nasal spray (Flonase)

But lately, I've been way more congested lately. Usually, that means I have a cold (or flu/covid/etc). I've tried the following, and sometimes they kinda work -- but only for an hour or so, and then congestion returns:

1. cold medicine (dayquil, nyquil)
2. Mucinex

I've also tried various home remedies:

1. Humidifier & eucalyptus
2. hot tea, hot water with lemon,
3. etc

​
​

1. What could I have?
2. And how can/should I treat it?

​
If it's just worsened allergy/cold symptoms, what should I do? increase dosage or add/subtract something?
​
If it's not as simple as worsened allergy/cold symptoms, what could it be? Why am I suddenly feeling I have a cold (or worse) all the time?
​
​
​
​

Introduction

This will be a long post and I will attempt to break it down into digestible sections. I am very grateful for you taking the time to read my story and potentially provide whatever help you can. I am based in Seattle and starting my own business so I don't have access to health insurance unfortunately, but when I was working in a corporate environment I had the opportunity to see an ENT specialist and I'll share those findings below.

Sections:

1. Overall Health & Lifestyle
2. Daily Symptoms
3. Medical History
4. Conclusion

Overall Health & Lifestyle

I consider myself to be a very active individual. I'm engaging in some level of physical activity everyday:

• Monday, Wednesday, Friday - 90 min strenuous gym session
• Tuesday, Thursday, sometimes Saturday - 60 min of yoga
• Weekends - Hiking, Snowboarding, playing sports, long walks, etc.

I am currently on no medications, and my body fat% is between 15-20% I would say. I try to eat as healthy as I can, lots of whole foods and proteins, but I do occasionally indulge in sweets and "unhealthy food" here and there. I would say I'm probably eating fast food maybe once a week, but that is paired with a pretty high intensity activity such as snowboarding or going for a very long hike.
I try to exclude dairy from my regular diet as I'm fairly lactose and tolerant, and out of the 21 or so meals we eat in a week (7 days a week X 3 meals a day) I would say I maybe eat out 2 or 3 of those meals on a weekly basis.
I would say that I'm very emotionally stable, my mood is generally quite high, and I feel good about the place I am in life. Great friends, great partner, awesome living situation all around and I feel very blessed and grateful to be where I am in life.

Daily Symptoms

For as long as I can remember, I've had issues with breathing through my nose. Ever since my highschool cross country coach told me how you're supposed to breathe while running - in through the nose, out through the mouth, and me feeling like drowning whenever I tried and employ that technique, I knew something was off.
I snore quite explosively (many friends have shared this with me) and there have been certain instances where my friends/partner check to see if I'm still breathing because it sounds like I'm choking in my sleep or something. I'm 99% certain I have some level of sleep apnea because I never feel like I feel totally rested whenever I wake up. Of course I feel rested when I get like 10 hours of sleep in, but I feel like there's another level of "restfulness" that I have not had the opportunity to experience yet in life due to my sinuses.
Every morning, I'm coughing up phlegm to a certain degree and trying to clear out my pharynx/throat and everything feels quite clogged and backed up in the morning after waking up.
I have also been experiencing tonsil stones quite frequently over the past year and I read that that was a potential symptom of sinus issues.
Overall I feel like breathing through my nose definitely requires more deliberate effort than it should.

Medical History

My first time encountering this issue with doctors was actually with an orthodontist initially. They were doing a scan on my jaw to see if I needed to get some kind of surgery to move my jaw back to better fit my bite or something. And during the scan, the doctors said they saw a large blockage of some sort and they emphasized that they typically wouldn't be able to see something like that on the kind of scan they were doing.
This was back in high school and heaven knows what in the world I was thinking not getting it addressed at the time, but here we are.
Last year I had the opportunity to see an ENT specialist about my sinuses. He prescribed me the following routine for 3 weeks:
Twice a day (AM/PM)

• Doxycycline
• Mucinex DM
• Afrin Spray (3 days on, 3 days off)

This routine didn't really do much for me other than give me diarrhea for a couple of days. The doctor was very confident this would succeed, but it did not work.

Conclusion

What should I try and do from here on out? I've tried the nose tape, it sort of helps a little bit but not much. I haven't tried mouth taping yet, but I'm open to any potential solutions that are available based on my situation.
I've been trying to mitigate this issue by living a healthy lifestyle, but sleep is definitely something I would love to have a healthier relationship with. Thank you very much for reading through this, have a great day!

I am 5’2 and 115 pounds.I took mucinex DM (12 hour release tablet) 12 hours ago and now I want to take dayquil. Would it be safe?

Simple, submit ideas that are reasonable and realistic. We all want more hours but that’s not going to happen so I want to help these geniuses by removing unnecessary tasks, metrics, positions, etc.
What’s being asked from us can’t be done. Team members are taking shortcuts everywhere and trying to cheat the system in every possible way to stay afloat and avoid being targeted by field supervision.
Feel free to drop comments and I’ll add them to this post whenever I have time.
I’ll get it started:

• Remove the “story of our store” and forget about anything related to Frontier, Pulse meetings, etc. I don’t have the time to update your silly poster and I most certainly don’t have the time to share with all the team members and explain to them what everything means. RVPs want DPRs and DMs to begin their walks discussing then poster and its metrics…. Yeah let’s all stand here and talk about sales being down while totes and full cases are sitting in the stockroom waiting.
  
• Rx Core Pharmacy Workflow - waste of time, does not help, do not ask us to waste our time logging in.
  
• MTM access for all techs. Really? Including the one that works 8 hours a week and will never ever be involved in an MTM? How about focus on the store meeting MTM targets, who cares about every single tech having a sign on? Stop chasing it.
  
• Some e-learnings are too long and do we really need to cover some of them every single year?
  
• Stop pressuring stores about Curbside pickup times, the main focus must be the fill rate %. The fill rate will improve if we get enough time to work on OSA. You want sales? This will help, the DPR, DM, MGR and some team members looking at the “story of our store” poster will not help.
  
• Don’t send CII complaints to the stores, we are paying fines and settlements from lawsuits, did you forget about them? You stopped sending CII complaints to the stores when that happened, you need to stop again.
  
• You blame us for shrink while our hands are tied and then you ship a massive Mucinex tower to the store.
  
• You want sales? Let us order. There are items that sell out the day that they arrive, if I could punch in a few pieces I guarantee you it would help our sales.
  
• Remove the BC and convert those hours to stocking. A 30-hour a week stock boy will bring in way more revenue than a BC. You could even set them in the system so that they don’t have register access, they are there to stock the shelves.
  
• HR generalist? Waste of money, remove the position.
  
• Western Union, reloadable cards, etc. please confirm that we in fact make money. Make sure that you throw into the equation the time that it takes for the MGR, ESM, SFL to go and approve the transaction, the IC3 that builds up, the additional cash pickups, the scams, the fake bills, etc. if after all that we are making money then leave it, otherwise shut that down, we hate it.
  
• Restrict your DMs to a 30 minute district conference call, some DMs keep us in the office for over one hour going over the same metrics over and over again while we watch the world burn and hear all the IC3s.
  
• Give us reliable internet and faster systems.
  
• Stop the handheld from logging out of MyInventory if you don’t use it for 5 seconds.
  
• Stop shifting EVERYTHING on some resets. Do you guys know how long it takes to move and shift everything around? Stop inputting images of products in a software and sending us the new plano, think of the millions of hours wasted per year because you want to shift items.
  

M33, 5’10”, 256lbs
Medications: Currently taking mucinex DM for a cold Albuteral inhaler as needed and QVAR as well.
I’ve been tracking my blood pressure for a few days and curious if I should be concerned or not. I have an appointment with my primary care doc on May 1 but want to see what y’all think.
I did three readings for each arm and then recently only did 1.
Blood pressure
4/11 Right: 144/88 141/91 144/95

Left: 131/87 146/97 142/91 

4/12 Right: 141/92 139/89 138/94

Left: 139/90 134/84 132/91 

4/13 Right: 158/98 150/90 151/96

Left: 142/95 144/92 137/97 132/91 

4/14 Right: 151/95 153/101

Left: 136/91 133/95 

4/15 Right: 143/99

Left: 136/94 

4/16 Right: 152/95

Left: 148/97 

Hello all; this may be a bit long but I wanted to give as much detail as possible.
I'm 21F, overall healthy, no underlying respiratory issues previously.
On Monday night, I started to come down with a cold. Symptoms were mild. Tuesday morning I woke up with a fever of about 100⁰. Not too abnormal for me. Wednesday and Thursday came and went, my fever seemed to subside (perhaps the Dayquil I was taking). All the while my cough wasn't getting any better (it's so stubborn that I can hardly take a deep breath or speak a full sentence without coughing to the point of gagging).
Friday night rolls around and my fever came back, reading at about 101⁰. So I went to sleep and figured I might see some improvement by morning given how long I've been sick for (my colds don't typically last longer than 4 or 5 days and symptoms usually improve each day).
Saturday morning I wake up, still have a fever, so I take my first dose of Dayquil for the day. I felt so sick though that I told my fiance that I'm going to urgent care. He comes upstairs, helps me get ready, and goes downstairs to wait for me. The second he starts walking down the stairs I start to have a coughing fit. Then I started to gag. Then my stomach started to turn and before I knew it I projectile vomited everywhere, it literally happened so fast I didn't have a reaction. Aside from this, nausea from the fever, and some diarrhea (again, typical for me when sick), I've had no other stomach issues. I only puked the once.
My fiance takes me to urgent care, and there my fever read as 102.2⁰. I had to carry water with me to try and ward off another coughing fit if it happened. I could barely get a full sentence out to explain my situation. They tested me for flu, Covid, and RSV, and this morning I found out all were negative. The PA told me it was likely viral and not something like pneumonia, and told me to take Tylenol and ibuprofen every 4-6 hours to help with the fever. Didn't tell me what to do about this cough. He prescribed antibiotics in case my results were negative (they were) and said if it doesn't resolve by Tuesday or Wednesday to fill it.
It's now Sunday night, and I am miserable. My cough is only getting worse and has been steadily getting more persistent since Tuesday. I find myself frequently coughing until I gag. I've tried throat comfort tea with honey, benadryl (to help the tickle in my chest), taking slow, deep breaths (which is now painful), drinking water and Gatorade, steam, an inhaler, sleeping more propped up and not flat on my back. Nothing is helping. I'm afraid to take mucinex because it's hard for me to stomach normally and I do not want to throw up again (I have a fear of vomiting). It feels like there's pressure in my chest and I know there's mucus in there, but I can't cough anything up. PA said my lungs sounded clear.
What do I do with this? Do I bite the bullet and try mucinex and see if it helps? Is this normal? My coughing is near nonstop and it's been like this for 6 days now, and I'm at my wits end. I should also mention that in the past, whenever I took Delsym, it never did much for me. So I haven't considered that option thus far.
Thanks in advance!

Hi ! I quit vaping mid 12 hour shift on Wednesday. I had no plans of doing so, I had some kind of temporary moment of clarify and knew if I didn’t act on it now, the feeling might not come again for years.
I was a smoker for many years and when I stopped that I went through physical withdrawal + coughed shit up for about a week. Quitting vaping has been different.
I am having the physical withdrawals but my chest feels very congested and I’m not coughing anything up! My voice has changed to very dry and raspy since I stopped and my chest feels heavy almost. I took mucinex DM last night hoping it would let me start coughing some of this stuff out but it didn’t do anything. Is this normal???? I was completely fine chest/lung/ voice wise before I quit and now I’m having all this weird stuff happen.

So as it turns out, I have COVID. The nurse practitioner who saw me decided to give me meds to help with my symptoms. I let her tell me about each one without telling her I'm a pharmacist. I just sat there cringing on the inside. I told her I was already taking Mucinex D and Ibuprofen. She gave me benzonatate and promethazine DM. She then proceeds to tell me that the 'D' in Mucinex D was the same as the 'D' in promethazine DM and to not take them together... Then she says benzonatate is an expectorant that would help break up my chest congestion...
Lord these poor patients that this lady sees... What if she misinforms people about other things than just basic cold symptom meds?
Scary

I've been wanting to write this post for a long time here. I find it so interesting how different peoples experiences are on Zoloft.
I was very hesitate on starting Zoloft, but it seem to make sense the most I talked to my therapist. For years I felt like something was "wrong" with me that I needed to take this medication to feel "normal". I would later come to realize taking a pill once a day is not the end of the world. I feel fortunate that it's available & cheap, and that other folks have to take multiple pills a day just to literally survive.
I started off with 200mg a day. After about 3 years, I dropped it to 100mg on my own without supervision. I managed, but it was difficult and should have had help. The idea was that I could prolong the amount of pills I have so I did not have to refill as often as I was still getting 200mg prescriptions. I was also traveling internationally which made it difficult to get it sometimes.
Missing a dosage feels like death. Anyone that has missed more than two days worth knows how hard it is to describe. I tried getting off it on my own a few times, and always failed. Or other times I would simply just forget. The zaps, anxiety, and emotions are overwhelming. I could cry and not understand why. I don't want to depend on Zoloft for the rest of my life and would like to eventually tapper off, but for now I'm sticking with 100mg until I see my doctor again. I suppose there's no rush really, but just hate the general idea of the task but again not a big deal as I learned.
I've noticed a lot of posts regarding alcohol and drugs on this sub-reddit so I want to share my own experience with this. I can't tell any difference with alcohol. I can easily drink a 6-pack. The only real issue is the day after may feel like I missed a days worth of Zoloft so I feel don't feel great, but that's only when I had a lot to drink. I can't say for sure that there's a correlation there, but the feeling does feel very similar to missing a day.
I have consumed Mushrooms and LSD with no issues. I have done extensive research on this, and it appears there's no change at all of serotonin syndrome.
The scariest moment though has been with Tramadol. I took I think it was 200mg of Tramadol and I actually did feel like death was coming and was a real possibility. It was a stupid thing to do, and it doesn't take long to find in searches that says not to take Tramadol at all with Zoloft. Serotonin syndrome is scary. Since then, I have been careful with other interactions with drugs. Small dosages of Dayquil/Nightquil have been okay, but I get too nervous about it and was only when I was feeling very sick.
Libido is a non-issue for me. I'm 40/m and my libido has always been high. It's either age or Zoloft that calmed it down a bit to more "normal" levels, but otherwise I have zero issues with it. This is in vast contrast to what others say though so YMMV.
Honestly, I can't tell whether Zoloft is still helping but I'm stuck with it for now because tampering off is impossible on my own. I do plan on seeing my doctor again about tapering off, but it just never works out. I need to speak to a therapist regularly while tapering off and I just can't afford how expensive therapists are. Hopefully eventually with better insurance. Getting a therapist in the US is so damn expensive and difficult.
I hope this helps someone out there. If you need to talk to someone or ask any questions, feel free to DM me.

After getting over my sickness, I was left with a post nasal drip lingering cough that ranges from annoying to full on heaving up mucus in the morning. I've found that taking Mucinex DM syrup has been extremely helpful, even letting me sleep peacefully. I ran out of medicine this week, so I decided to give the extended release pill form a try, since it lasts for 12 hours which is pretty convenient (the liquid only lasts 4 hours). But after using it for a day, it seems to not be as effective? I'm finding myself still coughing constantly, even waking up from coughs sometimes. Why is that? Technically the dosage in the pill is even higher than the liquid (600 guafenisin/30 DM in the pill, 400/20 in the liquid), so why isnt it doing its job? Is my stomach not absorbing this?